No exp. necc.

While the Oakland Raiders roster includes nine players who have earned an aggregate 16 Super Bowl rings, including four by weak-side linebacker Bill Romanowski, the Bucs have zero players who have ever suited up for a Super Bowl champion franchise.

	McCardell

Wide receiver Keenan McCardell does own a ring, but it was actually won while he was in absentia, on the injured reserve list of the 1991 Washington Redskins. "It's not like I'm out flashing that thing around and bragging about it," McCardell said this week.

Beyond that, only four members of Tampa Bay's current 53-man roster -- wide receiver Joe Jurevicius, offensive tackle Lomas Brown, linebacker and special teams ace Jack Golden and punter Tom Tupa -- have participated in a Super Bowl. Strength and conditioning coach Johnny Parker has been a part of three Super Bowl games, but last time we checked, he wasn't on the Bucs' offensive or defensive depth charts for Sunday evening.

So the question: Will it matter, once kickoff arrives in Super Bowl XXXVII, that the Bucs are the young bucks when it comes to title-game experience?

Ask the grizzled Romanowski, who has won two rings each with the Denver Broncos and San Francisco 49ers, and he launches into a filibuster on the significance of having been through the ordeal and learning to deal with all the purported distractions.

At the Bucs' hotel this week, however, most players have adopted the Alfred E. Newman (What, me worry?) approach. At least publicly, the organization in general is downplaying the notion that prior Super Bowl experience will help determine Sunday's outcome.

"It's still one football game on one day and just for that one time," insisted Brown, who started at left tackle for the New York Giants in Super Bowl XXXV. "I mean, when I played in the Super Bowl a couple years ago, it was against the Baltimore Ravens. Now what exactly does that have to do with this game? They are two distinct and different experiences."

	“	When I line up across from those (Oakland) guys on Sunday, whether I've been in a Super Bowl before or not won't matter one bit. It all boils down to what happens in that 60 minutes. Everything else is ancient history. ”
		— Bucs DT Warren Sapp

The numbers seem to indicate that a lack of Super Bowl experience should not keep the Bucs players and coaches awake at night. In the last three Super Bowl games, the winning team averaged less than 10 players who had made previous championship-game appearances.

McCardell, the 11-year veteran signed as a free agent last summer, barely remembers his Super Bowl XXVI experience. Like most players who are on injured reserve, he arrived late in the week, several days after active players, went to a few functions, watched the game and went home.

Jurevicius is more fixated on the health of his prematurely-born son, and dealing with the inherent media circus into which that human-interest story has now grown, that he hasn't had much time to consider the effects of a team that is mostly new to the Super Bowl experience. Like his teammates, though, he doesn't believe the Oakland edge in Super Bowl seniority will be a critical issue.

"Their experience in general, in all kinds of games, is better than ours," he said. "I don't think it's something we've focused on very much. I mean, if you're watching video of (free safety) Rod Woodson, you're not thinking, 'You know, he's played in the Super Bowl before, and I guess I'd better be aware of that.' It's an non-issue."

The Bucs are operating on the assumption that having played so many big games in recent years, even in losing causes, has galvanized them now for the biggest challenge in franchise history. This is a team that has become intimately familiar with pressure, has seen its mettle melt sometimes in the crucible of big matchups, but has been steeled by the experience.

"When I line up across from those (Oakland) guys on Sunday, whether I've been in a Super Bowl before or not won't matter one bit," said defensive tackle Warren Sapp. "It all boils down to what happens in that 60 minutes. Everything else is ancient history."

Len Pasquarelli is a senior writer for ESPN.com.